Piece to my Puzzle
by Heart2Heroes
Summary: Barbara Gordon, known to the world as Batgirl, returns from secret missions after three years of being missing. Unexpected, her return challenges her long time friend, Dick Grayson. Will the iconic duo every be the same after their lives have changed so much? Dick x Babs (Nightwing x Batgirl)
1. Chapter 1, The Return

_skip tap tap_

Light footsteps sounded around the boy as he held his staff tightly in hand.

He was on high alert, but calm.

It took experience.

 _woosh_

A swift movement from behind him. He reacted in a split second, turning and swinging his staff right to the victim.

"Got y-" Nightwing's hand froze before hitting the supposed enemy.

" **Barbara?** " he said, wide eyed as the redhead pushed his staff from her face.

"Easy there, you might poke an eye out with that thing." she smirked as she pressed her hands on her hips.

"What are you even doing here?" he asked, separating his escrima sticks and putting them into his side compartments.

Batgirl leaned against the cold brick wall, she looked at him with a raised brow beneath the mask.

" _Ohhh_ y'know, just checking up on an old friend."

Her smirk grew as she walked up to the masked man.

"Well thanks for checkin up Babs, but i'm kind of busy."

She walked right past him.

"Who says that old friend was you?"

The raven haired boy stood confused as she made her way to the planks of Gotham Harbor behind him.

"Have you lost your bats batgirl? There's no one else here."

She stopped in front of the ocean and took a deep breath of the wind zooming by.

"Yeah there is. She's all around us." Barbara smiled and turned around.

"It's good to be back."

Nightwing scoffed as he was preparing to leave,

"Well glad to have you back, I guess"

Batgirl spun on her yellow heeled boots and glared,

"You're _still_ mad at me?"

Nightwing stopped before pushing into the shadows,

"'I'll only be gone for a little while' she says after disappearing for three years."

Her eyes narrowed to the man in her sights,

"From what I heard **Grayson** , you got along just fine without me."

Barbara spat, reaching for her grapple and zipping onto a rooftop.

"I miss you too" he heard her say under her breath bitterly.

The former boy wonder remained stoned face, but as his former partner 'in crime' slipped away again, a strong feeling arose.

He was alone.


	2. Chapter 2, Good Talk

Dick Grayson arrived in the batcave to find the Batman brooding in his chair. He stared absentmindedly at the desk in front of his batcomputer.

"Barbara's-"

"Back. I know."

Dick walked towards the Batman, standing behind his chair. A silence complemented the

usual dark cave.

Only one light dimly lit the space around them, the bright screen of Batman's oversized computer

With the return of Batgirl, it was hard not to remember things like they were only yesterday.

Dick didn't try too much to get rid of the memories, and as he glanced at the old costumes in the capsules not too far from where he stood…

" _What were you thinking, Barbara? You could have got us killed!"_

" _I'd never put you in any more danger then what we're already in," she grinned, removing the cowl from her head_

" _Hey Robin? We make a pretty good team."_

 _The boy took off his mask and squinted his eyes at her before breaking into a smile,_

" _Dibs on the batcopter next mission."_

"Dick." Batman pulled the man away from his flashback and back to Earth.

"You should talk to her. I realise her leaving so suddenly was unexpected, but you can't allow that t-"

"Unexpected? Try uncalled for, Bruce. What right did she have to get up and ditch us like that? Without so much as a card after three whole years. What do you want me to do? Talk to her like nothing changed? Well news flash, they have. And she wasn't here for a damned thing"

Nightwing walked himself out of the batcave, placing a helmet on his head and shooting out on a motorcycle.

The cave became quiet, and the last thing heard was a subtle sigh from Bruce Wayne.


	3. Chapter 3, Loss

Under the big top, Grayson was able to get his emotions in check.

Whenever there was a problem, Dick went to the old circus that had been abandoned way back when the fates destined him to be Robin.

After becoming Bruce Wayne's adopted son, the circus became his home away from home.

Nightwing sat in the middle of the arena.

His legs crossed and his head down.

" _From what I heard_ _ **Grayson**_ _, you've been getting along just fine without me."_

His teeth clenched,

 _How could she think that after everything we've been through._

the boy wonder flipped up from the dirt floor and somersaulted perfectly onto his two feet.

Taking in a deep breath, he slowly turned to leave the tent, but as he was leaving, he heard laughter.

Childrens laughter.

Dick turned around and suddenly the seats were full of people, the lights shun on two acrobats, man and woman who held each other above the Earth.

Before Dick had time to process, their support beams loosened, and they were both falling.

"Mom! Dad!"

Nightwing rushed to save them but they turned to dust as they touched him.

Suddenly he was reliving the moment. The loss, the revenge, the frustration. Dick Grayson could feel the anger bubbling in him.

Behind him, a single ghostly light blasted on a slim figure standing nearby.

The dust was scattered into the dirt of the circus floor, and as Dick turned around, there was no crowd, or anger, or sadness.

His eyes met those of the redhead who stood before him under a stage light.

"...Barbara" he whispered and suddenly the floors started to stretch and the girl got farther away from him.

"Barbara!" he yelled trying to run to her but he was too late, the girl had vanished into a haze of darkness.

"I was too late."


	4. Chapter 4, Time and Ties

Barbara Gordon sat on her bed staring at the wall infront of her.

Her batsuit laid inches from her toes, and her mind lay miles away from where she sat.

The firey haired girl thought of the time she spent away from Gotham.

She remembered her encounters with strangers who became more, and some who became enemies.

She remembered hearing news of her family back home.

Some memories were kind, others more haunting,

the Batgirl returned to Gotham a year before the rest of the two that followed.

She came to see the boy she had known for too long, and dared she to say loved.

Little did Barbara know, she had already been replaced.

" _And this is what we Earthlings call pizza" the boy wonder smirked handing the alien a slice._

" _I have heard many names but… 'pizza' is most bizarre. What is pizza?" Starfire asked as she held the food in her hand._

" _Just try it," he said while taking a bite of his own._

 _The green eyed girl took a bite. Then another. And another._

" _Pizza is good!" she smiled causing Dick to laugh._

" _There's a lot of cool things on Earth, I could show you around if you want…" he said, swirling his finger in her curly, lava colored hair._

" _That would be most enjoyable."_

 _Babs sighed, a frown pressed down on the corners of her smile and she walked away without another thought or word._

 _Placing the photo of two kids in colorful costumes in her utility belt before quietly heading back to her ride_.

" _What are you doing? I thought you said you wanted out Batgirl?" her employer asked as she entered the back seat in silence._

" _I've changed my mind. What's the next mission?"_

A knocking tapped the window nearly startling the woman to death.

"Dick?" she whispered as she opened the curtains and peered into the dark.

"Tim." a voice said through the glass,

"You heard that?" she said nervously as she opened the window.

"Yeah I have a pretty good ear." he smiled as he handed the girl a bouquet of flowers with a card that read ' _welcome back'_

"Nice to have you back Babs" he said before rolling off her bed.

She stood and walked from her room to find the flowers a vase.

"Thanks Tim, I missed you guys so much"

she smiled while placing the flowers in a water filled vase.

The two heroes hugged and the Batgirl was instantly surprised by the boy's stature.

"Geez, you're almost as tall as me now" she giggled as he placed his mask on her counter.

"Time did me well," Robin smiled. He did miss Barbara, to him she was one of his closest friends.

Got him through rough times, calmed him when he was angry mostly at Bruce.

Everyone saw Tim Drake as the perfect Robin, but the redhead could see his flaws, and she was more than happy to help him overcome them.

"You've been gone for too long, Barbara. You and Alfred are the glue to our family. And Alfred could only do so much on his own."

The blue eyed beauty was silent as his words rested on her ears.

After a moment, she raised her head to meet eyes with the 3rd Robin of the batline.

"If you don't mind, Tim. I'd like to talk less about the bad stuff, and more about how you've been. Over coffee if that's alright with you?"

His frown shifted, and the boy sighed as he removed his cape and set it on her kitchen chair.

"Black with two sugars."


	5. Chapter 5, Gone Bat

Dick Grayson arose from his bed sheets drenched in sweat.

His heart raced and he attempted to calm himself as he slid his legs off his bed.

"That'll teach me to put the heat on high,"

he said as he turned down the thermostat.

The boy wonder wandered from his room into the dark of his living room.

Sitting on the couch, he sighed and pressed his face into his hands.

"What am I doing." he begged the question.

All he could think about was the girl under the mask.

Inches away from him stood a framed picture hanging proudly on his wall.

In it was two kids making silly faces into the camera.

A young redheaded Barbara, and a childish black haired Richard.

" _You're going to waste up the pictures on the camera in one day, Master Dick." Alfred said behind the duo._

" _Waste? Alfred, what better way to use up the camera then on memories of the day I got the camera?" he laughed as he raised his two fingers behind Barbara's head._

 _She did the same to him in return as he snapped another photo._

" _Yeah, these are very important pictures, Alfred. It's gonna be in Batman's top secret folder in a couple of years. You just watch"_

 _The two kids laughed as they took more, and with one last flash from the camera,_

Nightwing was awake from his daydream.

The boy was no longer tired. He decided, what better way to use his energy than playing dress up?

The acrobat leaped out the window of his apartment and into the corridors of Gotham.

He wanted to clear his mind with the open air around him, but at every turn he played another scene of Babs in his head.

The eccentric pair of Gotham, unstoppable and untameable as they brought down criminals from all over the city in style.

Images of them leaping and laughing from building to building played all around him until he froze once to see a familiar diner.

In the restaurant window, Dick could see a couple sitting across from each other

 _Both young, both laughing, and content with the other._

 _Ice cream sat in front of them, but little attention was being payed towards it as it started to melt._

" _Can you believe how far we've come?" Dick smiled gazing at the girl before him._

" _6 years of butt kicking." she laughed._

 _But she was soon pulled away from her smile when she saw someone standing outside the diner._

" _What's wrong Babs?" Dick questioned as she became slightly saddened._

 _Turning her head towards him, but seeming to look past him as she spoke_

" _I need to go."_

 _She said before getting up and walking towards the door, leaving money on the table for the bill._

 _Barbara froze for a moment, looking back at him. Her expression showed that she was holding something in._

 _Like she wanted to say something else._

 _Eventually she kept walking, turning away from him as quickly as possible._

" _I'll only be gone for a little while." she said before exiting._

 _Dick sat dumbfounded as she disappeared._

" _...Barbara?"_

A cop car raced by Nightwing with the siren blaring.

"Duty calls" he sighed before whipping forward after it.


End file.
